If you see the HITCHER remake...

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Remo D
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If you see the HITCHER remake...

Post by Remo D »

...tell me all about it. It's not playing near enough, and I'm seeing PAN'S LABYRINTH this weekend instead!
My dog's breath smells like peanut butter...

...and I don't even have a dog!
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dr coathanger
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Post by dr coathanger »

I will not being seeing the Hitcher. The adverts alone are enough to turn me off this tripe. What the fuck is that noise repeating in them anyways? You know, the one that sounds like rollercoaster screams fed through a synthesizer? Fucking annoying.
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Lode
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Post by Lode »

dr coathanger wrote:I will not being seeing the Hitcher. The adverts alone are enough to turn me off this tripe. What the fuck is that noise repeating in them anyways? You know, the one that sounds like rollercoaster screams fed through a synthesizer? Fucking annoying.
That is so hilarious. That noise drives my brother in law and I crazy too. Every time the trailer comes on we look at each other and try to immitate the noise to annoy each other even more. I'm glad we're not the only ones.

My uncle wanted to go see this new one with me, so we rented the original a few weeks ago. I actually was kindof annoyed at the original because the whole time I was just like "THESE THINGS WOULD NEVER HAPPEN IN REAL LIFE" Agh.
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Griff [Mola]
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Post by Griff [Mola] »

Lode wrote:I actually was kindof annoyed at the original because the whole time I was just like "THESE THINGS WOULD NEVER HAPPEN IN REAL LIFE" Agh.
That's funny. I don't remember THE HITCHER ever trying to pass itself off as true crime.

I think its a vastly entertaining film with some thrilling setpieces, some captivating performances, a good deal of tension and some very interesting thematical elements. Its a shame you were so close-minded when watching it.

I hope you didn't ruin it for everyone else by constantly vocalizing your astute observations ("Oh man, no way you could THAT." etc).

You'd get a punch in the face if you tried that shit in MY living room.
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Lode
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Post by Lode »

No, I'm not a completely annoying movie watcher - I don't talk through movies. I like to actually WATCH them. Which is what I did with this film. I didn't say I disliked the film. I said I was annoyed at the fact that it was unrealistic. And I in fact would like to see the remake...

**Spoilers**

I'm sorry - if you picked up a Hitcher, and he tried to kill you, and then you knocked him out of your car, you would be going to the nearest police station asap. You would not just drive along, and then when you see him in another car try to get them to pull over.

You also would not end up getting arrested for something you didn't do and then sit idly by while they try to call the car dealership place AND your brother with no answer at each place. You would make them keep calling, or call your mom or your girlfriend or something. (And the fact that he even gets arrested in the first place, because the hitcher stole his wallet!? PUH-LEASE! - your wallet would be on you - not in the car).

I am not close-minded. The plot was actually a really cool idea, and it is a classic film that should be checked out. I'm just saying that it's not all that realistic once it gets down to the criminal aspect.

I also didn't say anything remotely anywhere near the fact that I expected the film to be "true crime" - I know it's supposed to be a suspense thriller.

And I look forward to never watching a movie in your living-room. I hope that you don't hand out a punch in the face to everyone who disagrees with your theatrical opinions.
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Remo D
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Post by Remo D »

Okay, I caved. It IS playing near me, I DID see PAN'S LABYRINTH first, and the alternative was BLOOD AND CHOCOLATE (gee, a PG-13 teen-angst werewolf film hyped as being from the people who brought you UNDERWORLD... that might almost be as good as CURSED! Talk about "SKIP-a-dee-doo-dah..."). So, true to my nature, I had to see for myself what they did with THE HITCHER.

And I'm glad that I saw it--not because it's a particularly great movie, but because its flaws alone gave me plenty to think about.

So... SPOILERS for both versions lie ahead.

The new HITCHER knows how to make people jump, how to gross people out, you name it--it's as efficient a psycho film as one can reasonably expect to emerge from the daily sausage grinder. But it's missing the personal ingredients that made the original work the way it did.

In the original, C. Thomas Howell's Jim Halsey is completely isolated--as much of a non-person as John Ryder himself. He isn't even driving his own car--he's returning a rental vehicle to a dealership across the country as part of his job, and that's as much as you really get to know about him. His ordeal is his and his alone, and any attempt to let anyone else deal with it results in disaster. John Ryder is there for HIM, and one gets the impression that he would have turned up no matter which road Jim had taken.

So why does Ryder become Jim's personal demon? There are plenty of potential answers, but the one that comes to the surface most readily is one people don't really want to talk about. If Jim is enduring a "coming of age" ritual, then Ryder must represent a part of himself that's literally begging to be extinguished--and life will be pure hell unless he either completely accepts it or completely destroys it. And if you don't know what I'm getting at, then perhaps the constant themes of cigarettes, leather and chains might tip you off?

Ah, but as soon as you suggest that THE HITCHER might contain an element of homosexual seduction, then plenty of people won't want to hear it, plenty more will immediately attack the filmmakers for being gay bashers, and plenty more will accuse YOU of being a gay basher. And then the review turns into a defensive debate, and then we've lost sight of the movie itself, or the very concept that horror films are at their best when they're dealing with controversial, confrontational themes.

So now we get the 21st-century version, and while we keep the trappings (and most of the grossout/shock moments) of the original, we lose the personal odyssey and start "safe" with the young "spring break" couple. John Ryder still makes it his goal to be "dealt with" by one character in particular, but the element of seduction is completely gone. Sean Bean is, of course, a nastily effective villain, but there is no magnetism whatsoever to this scruffy psychopath (the polar opposite of Rutger Hauer's character). And if we're going to follow a similar path to divine a "point" to this version, then it's going to come down to the Sophia Bush character refusing to accept any form of male domination in her life... we also get the hint when the new Jim Halsey insists that he be the one to hold the gun at a key point. But it doesn't work nearly as well--first of all, Halsey is shown to be doing his best to deal with the situation and to confront danger when necessary: he's by no means the pathetic whiner that Ryder makes him out to be, and it's not clear at all why it's so crucial for Sophia to deal with this threat on her own--Ryder is scarcely a side of HER personality. No matter what the advances in special effects, the shock value of the "truck" scene is nowhere near what was achieved by the original. Of course, the original didn't spend half of its ad campaign SHOWING you the scene in advance, either...

"Yep, come see THE HITCHER and get sicked out watching a guy get torn in half by a truck. Listen to an endless series of pop songs on the soundtrack which prevent any individual mood from building. Jump at all the false scares and the obligatory 'dream' fake." The list goes on.

I should mention that there is one terrific, surreal moment in the middle of the film that DIDN'T happen in the original. It just falls out of the sky, it does. And there are other individual moments when you think you might be on to a more significant discovery than actually awaits you. Technically, the new HITCHER gets the job done, but it's as cynically mass-processed as it gets.

Which is not to say I wish I'd seen BLOOD AND CHOCOLATE instead.

Sheesh.
My dog's breath smells like peanut butter...

...and I don't even have a dog!
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Griff [Mola]
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Post by Griff [Mola] »

Lode wrote:And I look forward to never watching a movie in your living-room. I hope that you don't hand out a punch in the face to everyone who disagrees with your theatrical opinions.
Um, yeah, I do. I hand out punches on movie nights like they were slices of pizza.

As for your petty criticisms of the film itself, see Remo's above post for the type of analysis I can actually appreciate.
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